As you’re mapping out your 2017 travel plans, keep in mind our national treasures; our national parks. I’ve often said I would love to pack the car, plot a map course and just take off to explore each and every national park. We have definitely visited our share but we still lag woefully behind. And, I don’t remember a more relevant time than right now to pay attention to our parks.

The Classic Catalog

If you’re of a certain age there’s a pretty good chance you grew up with a copy of The Vermont Country Store catalog in the house, or maybe you discovered it as an adult. Either way, the catalog is filled with pages of wondrous treasures that find one happily reminiscing and thinking, “Oh, I remember those!”

“Ice cream is the perfect buffer, because you can do things in a somewhat lighthearted way. Plus, people have an emotional response to ice cream; it’s more than just food. So I think when you combine caring, and eating wonderful food, it’s a very powerful combination.” Jerry Greenwood

I’m not sure there is a better way to see the New York skyline than from the deck of a boat slowly cruising along on the Hudson and East Rivers. An even better view of the skyline is at sunset, on a cruise, on the rivers; it’s really pretty. And, it’s something quite special to pass by Lady Liberty with the sun slowly setting behind her.

It’s a tricky business to write a hotel review. I mean, think about it. How much can one say? There is a room, a bed, bath and hopefully, it’s clean and comfortable with a sense of style. That about wraps it up, don’t you think? But every now and then we come across a hotel(s) with a little something extra that makes us sit up and take notice. And that’s the case when it comes to the 4 boutique hotels in the Library Hotel Collection in New York City; each offering the finest in accommodations.

Meandering through the One World Trade Center, 9/11Memorial Museum, I had a moment of realization that there is now a generation of children who were not alive on 9/11, and as such had no real concept of what they were looking at in the museum, other than was was told to them by their parents. Amazingly, it has been 15 years.